Professor Danielle “Yell” Inverso has incorporated the Ida Institute tools into her Cochlear Implant rehabilitation course at Salus University in Pennsylvania, USA. She believes that the tools can help students learn how to motivate patients and their families to work together as a constructive team to manage their hearing loss as they live with a cochlear implant.
Undergoing surgery and receiving a cochlear implant is a significant life-changing decision. Patients and their family members must carefully consider whether these steps are right for them.
In her CI rehabilitaiton course at Salus University, Professor Inverso shows her students how the Ida Tools can help guide patients through the decision-making process. Inverso utilizes role-play exercises with real-life scenarios to allow the students to practice using the tools in different scenarios. After the role-plays, she asks all of the students to break into small groups and to reflect on the situation and offer potential action steps.
“The Ida tools were not developed specifically for cochlear implant patients, but that does not diminish their usefulness. The Ida Motivation Tools, for example, help students open a constructive dialogue with patients and get them to start talking about their motivation to go ahead with cochlear implant surgery,” states Professor Inverso. “We emphasize the importance of talking with the patient and their family members to find out where they see themselves going. Families often want professionals to make decisions for them, but our role is to inform and educate them so that they can determine what course of action is right for them.”
People with hearing loss often feel that they are the only one who is struggling with the issue. They tend to feel that they need to take on this burden alone. They are relunctant to involve friends and family in the rehabilitation process.
The Ida Communication Partner tools play a key role in Professor Inverso’s CI rehabilitation course. The Communication Partner tools helps give hearing care professionals a formalized way to tell loved ones that they are part of the process and that their involvement is critical for a successful outcome, according to Professor Inverso.
“In the course, we review how to talk to CI patients about expectations. Three weeks after survey can be a very emotional time, and family members have many expectations about what the success story will look like. There are so many unrealistic expectations, and that is part of the overall tension,” states Professor Inverso. “It is important to bring patients and their families back to the original expectations and goals. It is much easier to these concepts of expectation management with the Ida tools.”
Professor Danielle “Yell” Inverso is an assistant professor of audiology at Salus University in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania. She is also the manager of audiology at the Nemours/Alfred I. duPont Hospital for Children in Wilmington, Delaware.